Integrating Extensive Reading Instruction in Narrative Essay Writing: A Quasi-Experimental Investigation of Secondary School Students' Performance in Gwagwalada, Abuja, Nigeria

This study examined the effects of integrating extensive reading (ER) instruction on the narrative essay writing performance of public senior secondary school students in Gwagwalada Area Council, Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, Nigeria. Employing a quasi experimental pre-test–post-test non-equivalent groups design, the study recruited 260 Senior Secondary School Two (SS2) students drawn from two intact classes: an experimental group (n = 84) exposed to ER-integrated writing instruction, and a control group (n = 76) receiving conventional essay writing instruction. Performance was assessed using the COEMA rubric: Content, Organization, Expression, and Mechanical Accuracy, adapted from the West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) marking scheme. Data were analysed using descriptive statistics and Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA) at a 0.05 significance level. Findings revealed statistically significant differences in favour of the experimental group across all five dimensions of narrative essay writing: overall writing performance, content presentation, organisation of ideas, language expression, and mechanical accuracy. Post-test mean scores for the experimental group (71.30) significantly surpassed those of the control group (34.40), yielding a mean gain difference of 41.4 marks. ANCOVA confirmed large treatment effects (partial η² = .627). Gender-based t-test analyses further revealed that female students outperformed male counterparts across all subscales. These findings underscore the pedagogical efficacy of integrating ER into secondary school writing instruction and advocate for curriculum-level reforms to embed ER programmes in Nigerian public schools.